Harold B. Lehrman writes: “Unable to find ‘abecedary’ in Webster’s New International Dictionary, The Century Dictionary, or the OED [The Oxford English Dictionary], I call upon a philologist to enlighten me. John Noble Wilford used this word in his article ‘A Is for Ancient’ in The New York Times of November 9.” When someone can’t…
On Father’s Day, most dads open gifts of ties, or golf clubs, or clay items shaped by children’s hands, eat medium-rare hamburgers at family barbecues and talk a lot of huff about how they’d do anything for their kids. On Father’s Day 1995, chainsaw artist Skip Roth actually proved this to his children by shooting…
The story is told of an Orthodox man who stepped onto a bus in Jerusalem, eight children in tow. The bus driver, frustrated by all the chaos, barked out at him, “Why didn’t you just leave half your kids at home?” The man paused and then answered, “I did.” It may seem that the Orthodox…
The number of American casualties in Iraq is now well more than 2,000, and there is no end in sight. Some two-thirds of Americans, according to the polls, believe the war to have been a mistake. And congressional elections are just around the corner. What had to come, has come. The question is no longer…
Rabbi David Polsky mans the Orthodox Union’s Kosher Hotline from a small, plain white office at the O.U.’s headquarters in downtown Manhattan. In the corner he has a large bookshelf containing volumes of the Shulchan Aruch and the Talmud’s Tractate Chulin, and a number of other books on kashrut, or Jewish dietary law. His desk…
HOUSTON — In the second major attack on religious conservatives by a Jewish communal leader in recent weeks, the head of America’s largest synagogue movement delivered a speech last week condemning “zealots” on the “religious right” who spend more time fueling “anti-gay bigotry” than fighting poverty and other social ills. Rabbi Eric Yoffie, president of…
Images of stunning, flame-haired Hollywood “love goddess” Rita Hayworth were projected onto a huge translucent globe suspended above the ballroom of The Waldorf-Astoria for the November 1 Alzheimer’s Association Rita Hayworth “Meet Me at the Stork Club” Gala (so titled because “Rita made a point of meeting everyone there,” the program noted). The walkway to…
As United States and European governments seek to turn up international pressure on Iran over its nuclear program, Germany has agreed to sell Israel two sophisticated submarines that could be equipped with nuclear devices. The sale, decided by outgoing chancellor Gerhard Schroeder, was endorsed by his conservative successor, Angela Merkel, who took office this week….
a weekly briefing on the mother tongue Stanley Siegelman returns to the Forward with his inimitable genius in choice of subject matter, and his sparkling sense of humor. He calls his bundle of fun a “booby” mayse. As an introduction to this poem, he notes: “Mothers are campaigning nationwide for the right to breast-feed their…
TEL AVIV — When Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz announced his candidacy to lead Israel’s ruling Likud Party this past Monday, he was not just challenging the party’s presumed heir-apparent, Benjamin Netanyahu. He was indirectly challenging his own political mentor, Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, who had founded the Likud but left it this week. Moreover, Mofaz…
WASHINGTON — Last week’s suicide attacks on three Jordanian hotels has undercut Muslim support for Al Qaeda and the insurgents in Iraq, but also heightened concerns about their ability to strike Israel and other countries, experts said. “Unintentionally perhaps, the United States, through its actions in Iraq, has created a fertile zone where these militant…
